Exclusive: El Mayo Has Not Sung - Lawyer
Zambada's legal team is looking for a plea agreement that rules out the death penalty
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Sinaloa kingpin Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada has not given any information to U.S. prosecutors or agents about other drug traffickers or corrupt Mexican politicians since his arrest in July, his lawyer Frank Perez told CrashOut. Furthermore, Mayo is not looking to become a cooperator or informant but is prepared to make a plea agreement in which he would admit his guilt in exchange for the death penalty being taken off the table, Perez said.
“The issue right now is trying to determine whether the government is going to ask for the death penalty or not,” Perez said. “He has the death penalty eligible on two indictments so once the determination is made to do what they call ‘a no seek’, that they are not going to seek the death penalty, then yes, he is interested in a plea agreement. He does not want to go to trial…We don’t think [the death penalty], would be appropriate given his age and given the fact he was kidnapped.”
A trial would cost the U.S. government tens of millions of dollars and death penalty legal proceedings could stretch on years, Perez said. However, a plea bargain could be settled quickly and see Mayo in prison for the rest of his life.
Perez, a 70-year-old Texan who once worked as an undercover police officer in Dallas, is one of the most prominent defense lawyers in major drug trafficking cases in the United States; he has represented top cartel figures, including Mayo’s son, Jesús Vicente Zambada, or “El Vicentillo.” He spoke to me for several hours in Mexico City in his first long interview since Mayo was kidnapped in his native Sinaloa, flown over the border to an airport near El Paso and handed to U.S. agents on July 25. That kidnapping provoked a brutal civil war in the Sinaloa Cartel that has caused thousands of deaths and disappearances. (You can read about the Mayo kidnapping and Sinaloa war, here, here, and here).
The lawyer went on to say that Mayo does not have cancer, as has been reported, but does suffer from diabetes for which he is receiving medical attention at the Metropolitan Correctional Facility in New York where he is being held. Mayo is in an isolation cell, but gets daily counsel from members of the legal team as well as visits from his family, Perez said.
“He is in a good state of health, given the conditions that he is in, isolated, but he’s doing well,” Perez said.
The lawyer denied the notion that Mayo is trying to blackmail the Mexican government with a letter he sent to the consulate in New York last week. The letter was prepared by Mexican attorneys in the legal team, Perez said, and was in reaction to the extraordinary nature of Mayo’s arrest in which he was flown over the border without an extradition process. “He is not blackmailing anyone. He would like his rights protected but that is as far as it goes.”
Mayo Is Not Informing
El Mayo is alleged to be one of the most powerful narco traffickers that Mexico has ever known, working in the drug trade for half a century (Perez says Mayo was born on Jan. 30, 1950) yet he has never before set foot in a jail cell. Following his arrest, there were various reports that Mayo was sharing his wealth of knowledge on traffickers, drug routes and corrupt politicians with U.S. law enforcement.
However, Perez said this is categorically false.
“No…
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